ENCHANT — Juggling 9 Or Dropping 10 (review)

ENCHANT — Juggling 9 Or Dropping 10 album cover Album · 2000 · Metal Related Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
Warthur
On the Break album, Enchant gambled with a shift in their style, incorporating the atmosphere and aesthetics of late-1990s melodic alt-rock whilst retaining the prog compositional approach that they'd followed from the start, yielding a refreshed sound which they were able to take on the road supporting Spock's Beard and Marillion.

Juggling 9 Or Dropping 10 finds the group continuing in this direction, though with perhaps a bit more willingness to incorporate more overtly prog flourishes here and there, such as the keyboard contributions on Paint the Picture. With songs like Bite My Tongue still rooted in a guitar-oriented heavy melodic rock style, those who enjoyed Break will find this to be an apt followup, whilst those into the band's earlier neo-prog works will be reassured to hear the prog influence still there and present in their music.

In particular, as much as Enchant's sound changed over the course of their first five albums, there was a certain Rush influence which remained constant, even if they'd take different lessons from Rush's sound as their career progressed. One may also catch flickers of Dream Theater, Spock's Beard, or 1990s-era Marillion here and there, which just underlines how apt a choice of support act Enchant were for those groups.

On the whole, I would rank this just a shade below Break, which I think has the benefit of novelty going for it; here the band seem to be trying to milk more out of the same general sound, but could perhaps do with trimming the album back a bit - this came from that period in the late 1990s and early 2000s when everyone was trying to put out albums of at least an hour long, but I think if this were trimmed back to a tight 50 minutes or so it'd be a stronger release. Then again, challenge me to pick which 15 minutes I'd trim and I'd probably struggle, which is testimony to the consistency the group are able to attain.
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